Strong Enough (Meet Me in Montana 4)

Shit, I was thinking of freaking Kaci while Merit stood here and asked me to take her virginity. I was a prick. I didn’t deserve this gift she wanted to give to me. And moreover, I was terrified of how it would change things. It was hard enough to force down my feelings for Merit, but I did it because I adored her friendship.

My eyes met Merit’s, and a strange feeling hit me in the middle of my chest. A feeling that I couldn’t identify. What in the hell was wrong with me? I reached up and rubbed the ache away, staring down at her while I was at war with myself.

She smiled once more…and I knew I couldn’t say no to her. The idea of another guy being with her for the first time damn near made me insane.

Before I had a chance to change my mind, I said, “Yes. I’ll make love to you, Merit.”

Her eyes shone so bright, I swear she could light up the entire loft.

“I hope I’m not bad at it,” she said with a nervous chuckle.

God, this was why I wanted her. Her innocence was so freaking sexy. She wasn’t like other girls, who flaunted their bodies and tried to play with your head. She was as real as real could get.

I walked over to her and cupped her face in my hands and grinned. “You won’t be. Nothing about this moment could be bad because it’s you and me.”

My mouth pressed to hers in our second kiss. Technically, it was our third kiss. The first kiss was shared behind my barn, next to the chicken coop when we were ten, so many, many years ago, and it had been awkward for both of us, especially when our mothers found us out there.

Kissing Merit again, something inside of me ignited, but I pushed it away as fast as it came. I couldn’t let myself think of this as anything other than me being here for Merit. A favor. Something a friend was doing for another friend. I would ignore the burning desire to be her first and only. To claim her as mine.

Looking back, if I had only known an hour later she would tell me she hated me and never wanted to talk to me again, I would have never agreed to make love to her. I had ruined my friendship with Merit by saying one word.

One. Fucking. Word.

Chapter One

DIRK

Eleven years later - Tacoma, Washington

The feel of my body moving in and out of hers was like I’d died and gone to heaven. God, I was going to come, and we had only just started. The feel of her pulling me in deeper as she whispered my name nearly drove me mad. I wanted to crawl inside of her and stay there forever.

“You feel so good,” I whispered as she arched her body into me and silently begged for more.

My face was buried in her neck, and the smell of shea butter engulfed me. I loved that smell.

“Merit,” I said as I drew back and looked into those eyes that stole the very breath from my lungs. “I love you.”

I bolted up in bed and gasped for air. The sweat felt like it poured off of me as I glanced around the hotel room, my heart pounding in my chest.

“What in the fuck?” I mumbled as I attempted to calm my racing heart.

I glanced to my left and saw the girl I had met in the bar last night sprawled out on the bed, her blonde hair covering her face. The sheet was pulled down and barely covered her ass. Shit, I had fallen asleep in the blonde’s bed. That was something I never did. I really must have had a lot to drink last night.

With a sigh, I swung my body around and sat there as I tried to steady not only my heart, but my breathing as well.

Another fucking dream about Merit. I scrubbed my hands over my face and sighed. I’d been having them for the last five months. Ever since I saw her at the New Year’s Eve party at the Shaw’s house. God help me.

I shook my head and stood. One quick look around the hotel room showed my clothes had been stripped off my body with haste. The moment the blonde approached me at the hotel bar and started flirting, I knew I had drank too much. I knew where it would lead, yet I did it anyway. Because even though my body was in Tacoma, my thoughts were back in Hamilton, Montana, and I needed something to drown out those rampant images of my hometown and the female I couldn’t get off my mind. My thoughts weren’t even on Striker, the bull I had drawn and would be riding the next day, when they should have been on that very thing.